In our tests, the performance of the BIOSTAR P4TCA Pro is among the top and average in most tests conducted. Rather than looking at the board from its performance, it would be better to look at the capabilities of the board. In our usage, the system is rock stable when we pair it up using 2xCAS 2.5 DDR 400 Kingston modules. The system is very stable even at CAS 2, 5-2-2. We did not need to pump it up to 2.7v at all. The Voltage fluctuation levels are very steady as monitored from the BIOS. Thanks to a 4 phase voltage regulator design.

This board has a nice feast of features and some special ones that deserves mentioning is the Wireless LAN 802.11b which most boards has left out or as optional upgrade. The usual IDE RAID, SATA RAID is also available most of the boards tested so far. We also liked the colour coding of the front panel connector which makes life much easier.

Usually we don't expect overclocking features on workstation boards. BIOSTAR P4TCA Pro provides a range of FSB that you could choose from. 100~250 FSB is selectable and voltage adjustments can be made for Vdimm, Vcore. There is no adjustments for VAgp. The PCI/AGP can also be fixed to 33/66 or other settings available through the BIOS. The 4 phase design helps a lot and we are even able to POST at 238Mhz FSB! We tested the board and managed to run max at 218Mhz FSB at cpu:fsb=1:1 ratio. This makes it at around 3.3Ghz. The only disappointment is the limited options for Vcore adjustments.

Overall, I am very impressed with the stability and the option of wireless LAN on board. The only disappointment is no RAID 5 nor SCSI on board as this is supposed to be a workstation class board. The performance as I have said are similar to most of the high end Canterwood boards. The BIOS can be improved to include other languages. The BIOSTAR P4TCA Pro never failed to disappoint me as a board of choice because I do need that wireless LAN to replace that cluttered room of mine. It's a good board not to be missed.

Suggested Retail : -

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Pros 好处:

• 6 Channel audio
• USB 2.0 
• 1394
• Gigabit LAN
• Wireless LAN
• IDE RAID 0, 1, 1+0, SATA RAID 0
• Overclocking - up to 250Mhz FSB, PCI /AGP FIX selectable

Cons 坏处:

• No SATA RAID 1 only RAID 0 by ICH5R
• Vcore tweakable max is too low

Ratings

Here are my ratings out of 10 stars.

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